METRO TIMES

Blowout profile: Insite the Riot. MC part of strong hip-hop presence at Blowout.

By Brett Callwood

PUBLISHED: APRIL 29, 2014

Since the early days of Blowout, there have been hip-hop acts on the bill. Over the last couple of years though, rap has become an integral part of the festival — a breath of fresh air — thanks in part to groups like Passalacqua, Cold Men Young and Clear Soul Forces. And the music is always great.

This year, rounding out the Friday night Blowout at the Seven Brothers Bar in Hamtramck is a supremely talented artist who goes by the name Insite the Riot. She’s not interested in telling us her real name, and we’re not going to pursue it because she’s worked so hard over the last decade to brand herself. She’s a bright, razor-sharp woman, determined to prove through her own work and the work of others that hip-hop can be a positive, inspiring force for society. Ignorant stereotypes be damned — this lady makes sport of disproving every one of them.

Insite (as she likes to be called) has been performing since she was 8 years old. “That grew out of a love for DJ-ing initially,” she says. “My uncle, who I grew up in a household with, was a DJ. When I was younger, I used to sneak onto his turntables and play records. There was one particular record that I really liked, “You Can’t Play with my Yo-Yo” by Yo-Yo. I scratched his record up, he found it and put two and two together. I was essentially banned from the turntables, and since I couldn’t play the music anymore, I started creating my own. I’ve probably been doing performances in a real way since my early 20s. I’m 32 now, so 10 years or so.”...